


Lights

by covacola



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Angst, Getting Back Together, Guilt, M/M, Mentioned Noctis Lucis Caelum, Regret, Separations, Songfic, The gods suck canon sucks and no I don't fix it in this fic but I will eventually, World of Ruin
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-18
Updated: 2021-01-25
Packaged: 2021-03-04 01:35:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,238
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24785503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/covacola/pseuds/covacola
Summary: "I've been keeping this fire going / Every night since you've been gone / Feel it burn but I've never been colder /When are you coming home?"Songfic / exploration during WoR.Inspired by "Lights" by the Goo Goo Dolls, which is an absolute Polyship Roadtrip angst song imo.
Relationships: Gladiolus Amicitia/Prompto Argentum/Noctis Lucis Caelum/Ignis Scientia
Kudos: 13





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> [give lights a listen](https://youtu.be/jfE4u4ugeb0)

_ I know it's getting dark outside   
_

_ The stars are gone tonight _

_ And with them all my pride _

Four months have passed since Noctis disappeared into the Crystal. Daylight wasn't the only thing wearing thin. Who understood each other better than themselves, the three so close to the True King. Prophecies and destinies mean nothing to love, and even less to the guilt ridden lover. It did matter that it had been fate-- it made things far worse. To know, for certain, that their vows to protect him, to stand by him, were all for shit. Predestined to be shit. Nevermind how much they'd meant them. 

The nights were getting longer, tensions growing higher. They had returned to Insomnia, done everything they could. But they knew, deep down, it meant even less than those oaths. Darkness did not have claws, but words bite. Meaningless, or otherwise. They stayed close, needed to be close. Needed to hold onto the remnants that remained. But Darkness is not something you can hold onto, grip with paling knuckles and gritted teeth. It is not something they could ignore, the world could not ignore. It bled into everything, dulling, blurring everything it settled over. Dulled the sweetness of a kiss, blurred the lines between banter and accusation. 

They fought, they argued. They made up, because they understood. But they each were restless. Their lives had been led by action. No night, no darkness, could still them. They sparred and practiced, but it was hard when you knew each other's thoughts, their styles, their bodies so well. So one by one, they left that place, staked out on their own. At least, away from each other. They didn't say anything. They understood. 

Six months, and the world was enveloped in darkness. Six months, and they'd finally given into it. It had only taken six months. 

* * *

Clouds blocked out even the stars. Not even those pinpricks of hope would be spared them. But, eventually, they got used to it. Lestallum became that hope. Even in times of deepest loss-- so many lives, the sky itself, the whole world a ruin-- it is amazing how humanity sustains. Even in these literal darkest of times, humanity created its own light, its own hope. Humanity adapted, continued. A true wonder. 

They still saw each other, keeping Lestallum together. And yet they remained apart, each fighting his own fight, battling the Darkness, the daemons, and themselves, wrestling with their own weaknesses, their own stubborn growth. But darkness bleeds like a beating heart, alive and hurting. And somewhere, in that long night, each of them understood. They felt it. In the face of the terrible darkness, in the wonder of human endurance, who could go on without once stopping, transfixed by their own ridiculously miniscule self. 

For Gladio, it happened first, within that first year. He leaned back against broken stone, mounds of daemon corpses surrounding him, eyes burning from lack of sleep and adjusting schedule. Huffing there, alone, he slid down and sat, letting his head droop between his knees. He sobbed. Words echoed back to him, seemingly from another life.  _ My duty as King of what?! _

Another realization dawned over him, or rather "dusked" over him. Less like a sudden light of understanding, and more like yet another sun he'd taken for granted slipping silently beneath the horizon. He'd heard that voice almost his whole life. And yet, he could barely remember it now. Not so clearly, anyway. He couldn't ever forget it, but-- But now it was, truly, only an uncrisp memory. 

Instead, he'd heard it in his own voice. His mind, playing tricks on them all in these dark days, had twisted his words around like a knife in his gut. It mocked him, tore at him and everything he stood for. His mind hadn't thought  _ King _ , but  _ Shield. _

* * *

Prompto's was next. A year to the day. The guilt had settled, as had the resolve. Just another tattoo in the tapestry of memories imprinted, invisible to all others, into his skin, into his soul. He'd been trying to talk to Cindy, again. But it had crept up on him, the way feelings had a way of doing, and had overwhelmed him like an unseen wave. 

He'd closed his eyes, but then opened them again in the dark of Hammerhead. What was the point of closing his eyes now? He didn't have the energy to cry, didn't even have the presence of mind to feel sorry. He was so, so tired. All he had was a single thought, more a feeling than anything else. He was alone again. And, unbidden, the darkness added, so casually, like their old banter, that he had left them alone too. 

They'd needed time apart. There wasn't anything he could do about-- about-- --but the others. Not just Gladio and Ignis, but everyone. He could be there. Just as he'd always tried to be. But his realization was less about the thought, the feeling. It was the exhaustion. The darkness had swallowed all light. And now, it had finally claimed his. 

He sank to his knees, gun still at the ready. He wouldn't fall, even if something within him had already died. 

* * *

Finally, Ignis. Ignis was very good at keeping himself busy, at fixating so much on things that needed to be done that it left him no time for distractions-- nevermind if those were necessary, too. He trained, he accustomed himself to his disability. He learned to fight, to cook, to go through all the motions he had before. To not be a burden. And never once, in six years, did he ask himself, was he really content? 

The three of them had slowly fallen back into step with one another. It was like a force of nature, like wind or gravity-- intangible, inevitable. In some ways, it was even more than that. Six years of darkness and ruin had opened his eyes to the wonders of hope and love. Of humanity at its most raw. And destiny or no, Gods or no, that passion could not be forever stamped out. 

He'd seen people lose it, give up. He'd seen the devastation that could cause even more tangibly than famine or war. And yet, somehow, people always found a way back to it. Found ways to smile again, to love again, to feel again. And that was what had broken him. Six years. Six years, and he still hadn't let go, not really. Every morning he'd wake up. He'd long since been accustomed to the darkness, his most true of darknesses. It didn't startle him to open his eyes to darkness anymore. Lonesomeness. He had gotten used to waking up without the inherent knowledge of someone else just a room over, if not next to him in a crowded tent. And yet every time he woke up, it still crushed him as he awoke. He knew he would return, but for now, he was gone. 

He forced himself out of bed. Had gone about his day and his duties. To all appearances, nothing had been out of place. But within, he still clung. Unconsciously, painfully. He still tried to hide the vegetables when he made food. He still worried about such little things. It wasn't habit so much as stubbornness. It was like he refused to accept it. Even though he knew he would return, even though he knew what would follow. He stubbornly refused. He desperately clung. He wondered if this was yet only a bitter taste of what  _ he _ had felt, as he struggled to accept this fate. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> merry crisis

_I see your shadows on the wall_

_But lover's voice still calls_

_And echoes through the halls_

Disappeared into the crystal, but still there, ever present. He was their light. Their guide in the darkness. How many times had the heart-- so easily swayed, so quick to hope-- deceived them? A familiar form in the crowd, a voice that sounded so like his. A willing heart to be deceived, so easily broken again and again. 

It was hard to ignore the ghosts of what had been. So vivid were the memories, so acute the longing. To glimpse those snatches of moments once more. To forget that he wouldn't be in bed when they checked, unwilling to rise. That he wouldn't be there to laugh at a stupid joke or comment or pun. That he wouldn't be there sitting quietly with them in that painful silence. 

At least once each they broke, calling to him in the darkness. 

For Gladio, it was in his dreams, his nightmares. Over and over again, calling out as he faded into that horrible light. Sometimes he dreamed he was out there in that darkness, wandering, fighting along. And that Gladio wasn't there to protect him. Hadn't been there to stop him from being ripped away. 

He dreamed of the tears, angry and perhaps undeserved but it didn't feel that way, not in his dreams. 

But mostly he dreamed of his smile. The soft, contented smirk he missed so much. The way he'd whisper his name in the night. The way he called out to Gladio in the midst of it all. A question, a plea for some semblance of safety, stability, his rock when the storms hit and the seas were unsteady. _"Gladio?"_

For Prompto, it had been in those months he'd roamed. Overwhelmed with sorrow and a heart wracked with guilt, against his better judgement he cried out. Yelled, shouted, screamed, calling to him. Begging, praying, willing for that familiar voice to answer from the darkness. 

He never did. 

Sobs wracked his body but he didn't fall to his knees. He called out until his voice gave out and still his legs continued on, searching. He would walk the whole world, traverse every inch of this place until he found him. He'd have walk into hell for him. He'd have clawed his way to the heavens. If only his legs hadn't given out. 

Ignis talked in his sleep. Murmurs at first, but the time spent in seclusion did away with such subtlety. He'd wake, his first breath a choked cry. His name. Over and over again. Night after night, hour after hour, every time he woke it was always the same. Not a full breath, his yearning released with the air, knocked out of him by the fear and hurt and anger. 

Even when the tears stopped. Even when there was no longer the disjointed memory of what had been, of how he'd had to learn to live. Even when normalcy had meant life without him. It never stopped. He never stopped calling for him with that first, short breath. 

_but you're not here_


	3. Chapter 3

_I keep leaving the lights on for ya_

_Every night since you been gone_

Sometimes, Prompto thought himself an idiot. Even as the days got shorter, muscle memory still told him to be accommodating, courteous. He didn't need to poke around the room in the dark, because no one was napping in the bed. He stopped loading the game up to pass the time, it felt wrong to play King's Knight with just Gladio. 

I keep leaving the lights on

Cause I know you're coming home

Ignis bore the weight of his knowledge with every ounce of strength he could muster. His load was heavy, but it was his. It was sick and twisted but he carried it, cursing the Gods in the same breath he preached of Noct's return. But what would come after he withheld. His little secret. Their little secret. 

He kept the people's hope alive, his had long since been buried. Drowned in the Leviathan's seas. Beaten down by the weight of generations of prophecy and promise. He knew Noctis would return, but it was fact rather than hope. Having seen the Gods with his own eyes, the Scourge and Ardyn and everything, well-- he didn't, couldn't find it in him to hope. 

But he continued his reassurance, kept up the belief, the hope, the light. Even through his own darkness.

_I've been keeping this fire going_

_Every night since you been gone_

_Feel it burn but I've never been colder_

Gladio never stopped. He kept pushing, pushed harder in fact. His charm worked to keep the people he came in contact with motivated to keep going, to not give in to the weight the world was crushing them with. 

Camp was cold as everything else in this shitty new world without him. Ignis eventually told him and Prompto what was to come. And guilty, Gladio sometimes wished he hadn't. Sometimes almost wished Noct wouldn't return, wouldn't fulfill his part. 

He was proud of Noctis, of course. Knew he would go to his fate with strength. Gladio had helped him develop that. And sometimes he felt like an imposter, a hypocrite. Because he wasn't entirely sure he had the strength to let him go again. 

He did everything to live up to it. To what he'd been, who Noct had become. He wouldn't stop, couldn't stop. He knew he'd let him go again, in the end. Even if he wasn't strong enough. All that was left to do was keeping going, persevere until time came. It slowly gouged his heart out. But even then, he never let himself lose that determined passion. 

Some days, he wondered how long he could last like that.

_When are you coming home?_


End file.
